I am awkwardly conscious of his physicality, of the moment when he was half awake and pulled me against him. “Because I am difficult to charm,” I say.
That makes him give a soft laugh. He reaches out and touches my hair, traces the hollow of my cheekbone. “I could have told my brother that,” he says, with a softness in his voice I am utterly unprepared for.
“If you hadn’t allowed Madoc to bar me from seeing you, I might have told you all this sooner. I have information that cannot wait.”
Cardan shakes his head. “I know not of what you speak. Madoc told me that you were resting and that we should let you heal.”
I frown. “I see. And in the interim, Madoc would no doubt take my place as your advisor,” I tell Cardan. “He gave your guard orders to keep me out of the palace.”
“I will give them different orders,” Cardan says. He sits up in the bed. He’s bare to the waist, his skin silvery in the soft glow of the magical lights. He continues looking at me in this strange way, as though he’s never seen me before or as though he thought he might never see me again.
“Cardan?” I say, his name tasting strange on my tongue. “A representative from the Court of Termites came to see me. She told me something—”
“What they asked in exchange for you,” he says. “I know all the things you will say. That it was foolish to agree to pay their price. That it destabilizes my rule. That it was a test of my vulnerabilities, and that I failed it. Even Madoc believed it was a betrayal of my obligations, although his alternatives weren’t exactly diplomatic, either. But you do not know Balekin and Nicasia as I do—better they think you are important to me than to believe what they do to you is without consequences.”
I consider how they treated me when they believed me to be valuable and shudder.
“I have thought and thought since you were gone, and there is something I wish to say.” Cardan’s face is serious, almost grave, in a way that he seldom allows himself to be. “When my father sent me away, at first I tried to prove that I was nothing like he thought me. But when that didn’t work, I tried to be exactly what he believed I was instead. If he thought I was bad, I would be worse. If he thought I was cruel, I would be horrifying. I would live down to his every expectation. If I couldn’t have his favor, then I would have his wrath.
“Balekin did not know what to do with me. He made me attend his debauches, made me serve wine and food to show off his tame little prince. When I grew older and more ill-tempered, he grew to like having someone to discipline. His disappointments were my lashings, his insecurities my flaws. And yet, he was the first person who saw something in me he liked—himself. He encouraged all my cruelty, inflamed all my rage. And I got worse.
“I wasn’t kind, Jude. Not to many people. Not to you. I wasn’t sure if I wanted you or if I wanted you gone from my sight so that I would stop feeling as I did, which made me even more unkind. But when you were gone—truly gone beneath the waves—I hated myself as I never have before.”
I am so surprised by his words that I keep trying to find the trick in them. He can’t truly mean what he’s saying.
“Perhaps I am foolish, but I am not a fool. You like something about me,” he says, mischief lighting his face, making its planes more familiar. “The challenge? My pretty eyes? No matter, because there is more you do not like and I know it. I can’t trust you. Still, when you were gone, I had to make a great many decisions, and so much of what I did right was imagining you beside me, Jude, giving me a bunch of ridiculous orders that I nonetheless obeyed.”
I am robbed of speech.
He laughs, his warm hand going to my shoulder. “Either I’ve surprised you or you are as ill as Madoc claimed.”
But before I can say anything, before I can even figure out what I might say, a crossbow is suddenly lowered at me. Behind it stands the Roach, with the Bomb at his heels, twin daggers in her hands.
“Your Majesty, we tracked her. She came from your brother’s house, and she’s here to kill you. Please step out of the bed,” says the Bomb.
“That’s ridiculous,” I say.
“If that’s true, show me what charms you’re wearing,” says the Roach. “Rowan? Is there even salt in your pockets? Because the Jude I know wouldn’t go around with nothing.”
My pockets are empty, of course, since Balekin would check for anything, and I don’t need it anyway. But it doesn’t leave me a lot of options in terms of proof. I could tell them about the geas from Dain, but they have no reason to believe me.
“Please get out of the bed, Your Majesty,” repeats the Bomb.
“I should be the one to get out—it’s not my bed,” I say, moving toward the footboard.
“Stay where you are, Jude,” says the Roach.